I Am Hardstyle Review
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HE is the true master, when it comes to quality hardstyle and tracks. He’s in the scene for years, traveling through countries, to spread his vision of hardstyle. I’m glad he’s still in the scene and in love with the harder styles. He is known as Brennan Heart or Blademasterz, brought you tracks like “One Master Blade”, “Imaginary”, “Lose Your Mind”, or “LSD”.

His album broke boundaries and his documentation gave you Goosebumps all over, since he showed himself as a normal guy, with normal problems. His successful label WE R, with its sub labels WE R Raw and WE R Tomorrow, covers a wide range of different artists, styles and he recently had the chance to establish one big brand: I Am Hardstyle – a powerful name.

It was the week of ADE, when whole Amsterdam turned black and yellow and hundreds of venues offered great parties and events. On Saturday 17th of October the only hardstyle party during ADE took place in the Heineken Music Hall – Brennan Hearts own event I Am Hardstyle. The line-up looked pretty nice and since we’re in love with Brennan Heart, we couldn’t resist to be a part of it!

I AM HARDSTYLE

Starting with the location I really need to admit, it was my first time in the Heineken music hall, but thankfully I lost my virginity that night. I think it’s a lovely arena. It’s not that big and offers space for about 5000 people. You have two separated floors, the Blackbox, which is the main hall and the Beatbox, which is the small area upstairs. Again, I’m very thankful for the extra smoking areas and the smoking prohibition on the floors, this makes indoor events so much more enjoyable. Can we please have this at Qlimax as well?

The small area was nothing special. Behind the DJ booth, they placed a wall with some LED stripes and lights – On the sides the speakers, which were pretty powerful for such a small area! Especially during the raw acts you definitely needed ear plugs.

The day before Revealed Records just thrown a party in the Heineken Music Hall, so I guess they decided to set up a more overall stage design. It was satisfying! Since I Am Hardstyle was not sold out, we are talking about 3500 people, who visited the event and equal to that size Q-Dance did an awesome job!

That’s the quality I want to see and I’m used to, since my first Q-Dance event. The stage had the design of a pyramid, with a huge LED triangle, the DJ booth was also covered by an LED screen, ranging from left to the right and additionally packed with 6 big spots.

Furthermore, you had one huge rhombus shaped LED screen on each side, surrounded by lights. In addition, they placed 7 moveable ‘construction stripes’ packed with lots of lights, which was really awesome and gave the stage the final touch it needed. In front they also placed fire and C02 to underline the stunning light and laser show! The sound was very well balanced, pumping, but more importantly very clear – I loved it!

I AM HARDSTYLE

We started our night after some drinks in the Blackbox with Sound Rush. These two upcoming twins gained a lot of attention with their song Frozen and are responsible for this year’s Euphoria anthem!
They played a solid opening set, with some older classics in between. Thankfully, this specific and loved time era is coming back more and more, creating the ultimate ‘I want to go back in time’ feeling on the dance floor!

I was actually a little hyped for the next act, Audiotricz. If they want, they can deliver a very nice performance, like the one I discovered at Intents Festival! But somehow they really did disappoint me this time. Their set was just boring, although they had some good tracks in between like the Wish Outdoor anthem, I really need to say Sound Rush was by far way better.

Especially during their hard drop bullsh*t tracks like ‘Infinite’, which is such a bad and low quality track, the set lost its complete drive and made me and others stand around like some bored sheeps on a f*cking meadow. Sorry Audiotricz … this was sh*t!

But there was light at the end of this dark tunnel. And yes, I was confused when I saw the running order for I Am Hardstyle. What is this Luna doing right in the beginning – his sets are normally way too rough for this set time and since I Am Hardstyle was not a raw event, I kept asking myself if this can be good. But he just blew me away as one of the highlight sets of the night! Bring back the old school – 30 minutes of pure shivers and Goosebumps during all of the tracks!

What an awesome set, packed with just the best classics. The crowd went wild on tracks like Hyperdrive – The Punishment, so did we. Thank you so much Luna, you nailed it! Great performance, awesome tracks and 30 minutes who passed by so fast, that I wished he could have played longer!

I AM HARDSTYLE

Although I loved Lunas performance, I couldn’t wait for this one! He is one of my personal heroes, since I discovered the first hardstyle sounds! Brennan Heart was about to play a 1.5 hours set and although I had real high expectations, he not only did fulfill them, he topped it and played such a massive set, I will never forget! Packed with all his best tracks, no matter if they were old or more recent he did made the crowd lose their minds!

I had so much fun during that set. In between all his common tracks, you also heard two new ones and seriously, one of them is such a beautiful track and can’t describe the feeling when he dropped it! Also, his new Blademasterz track ‘Still Here’ was played and is currently my favorite track!

But the set was not only the perfect mix of older, newer and completely new tracks, but also containing awesome remixes of In The End by Dailucia or Musical Impression remixed by Toneshifterz and rougher tracks by Sub Sonik like Outta My Way or his own version of F.I.F.O.

Suddenly he dropped Hardcore Vibes by Dune and OMGGGGG, damn that was so awesome! The next and last 30 minutes of his set were pure magic, with the live versions of Imaginary and Follow The Line, together with Jonathan Mendelson and the live version of Lose Your Mind – wow, just incredible! You could really feel his passion for this music and watching him enjoying his own event and set as its best made you just smile as well!

But let’s continue with TNT, who just created this style break. It was a good set, with their euphoric influenced tracks, with the slightly harder climax parts. I really like their new song A.Y.B, really cool melody. I was not disappointed, but in the same way not very surprised or affected. I think their style is nice and technically on a very high level, but it’s just not my style. But 30 minutes was the perfect length for them and they wrecked the place!

I AM HARDSTYLE

Another highly appreciated producer and DJ, who just secured his place in my top euphoric hardstyle producers, with the power to create diverse, emotional but also slightly harder tracks! Code Black bring it on! Brennan Heart did join him on stage and together they played a really cool set! Thankfully Code Black is back with some new tunes like Triangle, which gets better the more I listen to it and with Predator. A solid raw track, with typical Code Black elements – although I appreciate the anti-climax, I would still love to hear at least one climax part with the melody!

Okay, time to switch the place, at the moment I can really forgo Zatox, please return to your quality productions you brought to us in the past. Time for Sub Sonik, who is doing a really good job at the moment! Not only with his live act at Supremacy, he just surprised me, but also with his latest productions he gained a lot of attention.

Creating stunning melodies with crazy screeches and a really good kick – that’s his signature. I need to admit some transitions were pretty bad in his set and not on beat. Also the fast breaks, when he switched to the second track, where not always perfect and I think he knows that. But the tracks he chooses were really nice and I enjoyed his set anyway.

Time for the last three sets, starting with Ran-D. Back with some fresh releases like ‘FCK EDM’, ‘I Am Legion’ or ‘Firestarter’ he just made the perfect transition to some rougher sounds – time to go crazy! Awesome as always he has play a ground-shaking set packed with his best tracks and common rawstyle tracks.

Although I love his style and tracks, he could manage to bring more diversity in his set. They are good and the tracks are well chosen, but to complete his set and turn it into a really good one, something is missing. But that’s bitching on the highest level!

I AM HARDSTYLE

I was excited for the next act, because I really feel like – you can’t listen to his tracks on headphones, you need to experience them on a real sound system on a festival. Endymion made a great show and delivered a really good set. Their newer tracks and also the one by other Nightbreed members have so much power, when they got played on a massive sound system, that you can’t resist and totally lose control. This Is SPARTA – lovely remix! But also ‘Sweet Insanity’ or ‘Raver Religion’ sound just massive! Furthermore the tracks were perfectly mixed and you never felt bored during his set! So I’m not even mad that they switched to rawstyle!

Last but not least Outbreak and Digital Punk. Time for the real sh*t! In my opinion Digital Punk is doing a wonderful job at the moment! His Supremacy anthem is the best anthem I heard so far this year, creating such a cool and fitting atmosphere – an awesome combination of heavy screeches and a nice melody with a bright lead. But also his crazy track ‘Rest In Hell’ with these awesome shooting breaks, ‘Unleash War’ with Warface or ‘Whiplash’ together with Adaro is worth to mention!

And yep, finally Outbreak is back with some nice tracks and his new Rebel Territory E.P. – So, we had a cool combination in the end. The set was awesome and a worth ending for I Am Hardstyle! In the last 15 minutes they just dropped some hardcore, everyone was waiting for and ended up I Am Hardstyle with style! Good job guys, come by and get yourself your deserved cookie 🙂

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